This invention relates to a record player and, more particularly, to eject apparatus for a self-contained record player of the type having a turntable which is movable into and out of a housing.
In a self-contained record player, a phonograph record may be placed upon or removed from a turntable by ejecting that turntable from its self-contained housing; and a newly-loaded record may be played back by returning the turntable into its housing. Advantageously, record players of this type exhibit relatively small height dimensions such that they can be used in many locations and integrated with other audio equipment which, hitherto, might have been inconvenient. Since the actual record-playing, or playback, operation is carried out within the housing, manual access to the usual tone arm is inhibited. Hence, automatic playback operations are performed, whereby the tone arm automatically is moved to its so-called lead in position and, after the entire record has been played back, the tone arm automatically is returned to its "rest" or reset position. In some self-contained record players, the tone arm may be advanced automatically to a desired one of plural selections on a record and then returned to its reset position after that selection has been played back.
In automatic, self-contained record players of the aforementioned type, an "eject" operation to withdraw the turntable from the housing cannot be performed until and unless the tone arm is returned to its reset position. Thus, if a user wishes to change the record then being played back by the record player, he is prevented from doing so until the remainder of the record, or at least the remainder of the selection then being played, is completed. At that time, the tone arm will be returned automatically to its reset position, and the turntable may be ejected from its housing to permit a change of record.
The aforementioned delay in ejecting the turntable from its housing is inconvenient and, often, highly undesirable. Even if the record player is provided with a "reject" control, whereby the tone arm may be raised automatically from the record and returned to its reset position at anytime in response to the actuation of a reject switch, the turntable still cannot be withdrawn, or ejected, until the tone arm has been fully returned to its reset position. Here too, the delay in ejecting the turntable is undesirable.